1. Field of the Disclosure
The present disclosure relates to an image capturing apparatus and an image capturing method that are preferably applied to apparatuses having various types of image capturing functions, such as electronic still cameras and mobile phone terminal apparatuses with a camera function. More specifically, the present disclosure relates to a technique of assisting determination of a composition at the time of capturing an image.
2. Description of the Related Art
According to the related art, when an operator captures a still image using an image capturing apparatus, such as an electronic still camera or a mobile phone terminal apparatus with a camera function, the operator causes a display unit of the image capturing apparatus to display the image that is being captured and checks the displayed image. If the checked image is appropriate as an image to be taken, the operator presses an operation button corresponding to a shutter button and records (stores) the image.
When such image capturing is performed, the composition of the captured image is adjusted in the following manner. That is, for example, the operator adjusts the angle of view using a zoom lens, which is attached as an image capturing lens, so that an image of a subject with an appropriate size can be captured. Also, the operator directly operates the image capturing apparatus in order to determine a composition in which the subject is placed at an appropriate position in the set angle of view.
The angle of view can be adjusted in a similar manner by extracting part of captured image data, instead of using the zoom lens. In recent years, the number of pixels of an image sensor provided in an image capturing unit has been increasing, and thus an image with a sufficiently high resolution can be obtained even when part of an image is extracted.
FIG. 21 is a diagram illustrating an example of state transition in the case of capturing a still image using an image capturing apparatus according to the related art.
First, when the image capturing apparatus is started (step S11), a so-called through display state occurs in which an image captured by an image capturing unit in that state is displayed as is on a display unit constituting an electronic view finder (step S1). In this state, if an operator performs half-press of a shutter button, that is, if the operator halfway presses the shutter button of the image capturing apparatus (step S12), the state changes to an adjustment/fixing state (step S2). In the adjustment/fixing state, an autofocus process of focusing a subject of the image and a process of adjusting an exposure state are performed, and an image that is in a state where the focus is fixed and that is ready to be captured is displayed on the display unit.
If the half-press of the shutter button is released in this adjustment/fixing state (step S14), the state returns to the through display state in step S1. On the other hand, if full-press of the shutter button is performed, that is, if the shutter button is fully pressed in the adjustment/fixing state (step S13), an image taking process is performed in which the image data captured by the image capturing unit at the timing when the shutter button is pressed is taken (step S3). Then, the state returns to the through display state in step S1.
Image capturing is performed in this manner. Generally, the composition of an image is adjusted by the operator by determining whether the composition of the image obtained in the adjustment/fixing state in step S2 is appropriate or not.